Ramen Quest: IPPUDO SG at Mohamed Sultan

23112014

MY RAMEN quest is turning out to be the perfect excuse to go through the list of all IPPUDO SG branches islandwide – all four of them. I’ve been to three. The first is here. This post is about the second one: IPPUDO SG at UE Square (along Mohamed Sultan Road), #01-55/56, 207 River Valley Road, Singapore 238275.

My bowl of ramen at IPPUDO SG at Mohamed Sultan. It’s all about the Hakata–style noodles for me.

My chosen “featured” ramen, calm and collected, just right before I wreaked havoc onto it.

That pinch of a Japanese pepper pounded to a paste makes this bowl a “featured” ramen, as opposed to a “classic.”

For some reason, the noodles at this branch seemed much thinner. The promised texture – “springy” as the menu brandishes – can only really be had when the noodles are served “very hard”, exactly my preference.

It’s all about the noodles. I actually fight with myself whenever faced with a steaming hot bowl of IPPUDO ramen. I can almost consume this in a flash. But restraint and the attempt to pace the eating – almost as if rationing it to myself – does generate much enjoyed delayed gratification.

I am nothing if not a creature of habit. And the extra serving of noodles has always been requisite to a most satisfying meal at IPPUDO SG!

This delusion of a much reduced noodle diameter in the expected doneness, coupled with the signature clean, deeply flavored Tonkotsu broth, sealed the fate of this ramen. To steal the title of a favorite Vertical Horizon song, “best I ever had.”

And I had a couple of add–ons to prove this claim: a cup of steamed Japanese pearl rice and an extra serving of the noodles. Both do exactly what they are supposed to do – soak up the awesome broth, something diners would always be reminded of everytime they look up from their bowl and see the wall art that is the Oriental soup spoons.

I can see the relation with the Mandarin Gallery branch. The bowls are there. The spoons are here. Great ramen is at both.

Anyone who cannot appreciate the ingenuity of hanging all those spoons on the wall as a decorative, artful treatment has no right to witness beauty in any of its form.